Ninainvorm Ceramics

So pretty, so perfect. There is not a single thing I do not wish to possess in the etsy shop of Dutch artist Nina van de Goor. I have been trawling through her shop for hours and I keep going back for seconds. Created from both new and vintage materials, each piece is unique and perfectly 're-designed'. Nina also writes an absolutely beautiful (and interesting) blog Ninainvorm, you should totally check it out!

all images are courtesy of Ninainvorm

five fave's of the week

I had so much fun last week I thought I would play along with  Pip from Meet Me At Mikes again this week, besides, some times it's good to end the week on a happy note.

So, my five favourite things from the past week are, in no particular order.

1 - Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain, such a pleasurable read and a real romp.

2 - Making Quince paste in the dark, This culinary adventure happened to coincide with earth hour and I have to say it was quite a heady experience. Beeswax, Quince and Chardonnay, if only I could have bottled the vapours being emitted from my kitchen last night.

3 - Stinky, creamy, blue cheese all to myself!

4 - Gladiolas, my favourite Autumn cut flower. I picked a couple of bunches from the market this morning from my flower guy.

and lastly

5 - Jamican style curried goat as prepared by Andrew, melt in your mouth Caribbean goodness.

Wishful One day's

I'm feeling a bit more inspired by stuff this week, thanks to Holly from Decor8, who posted some awesome stuff from the uber talented Rie Elise Larsen. I haven't found any Australian stockists for Rie's product's, but someone should totally get on that! Also in the mix, plastic loveliness from Lovelylovely and some Orla Kiely linen.

round metal lampshade in yellow

long metal lampshade in turquoise

textile cable in green

(all images from Rie Elise Larsen)

Hot pink vinyl lace doily from Lovelylovely

Flower Blossom Duvet cover by Orla Keily

sigh....................

Bucket's & Spades

Bucket loads of crap and a couple of chairs, that is!

I had planned on posting a nice little 'before and after' upholstery number I'm doing on a couple of teak, 'Spade back' dinning chairs, BUT although I have the before, I just didn't quite get around to the after. You see the thing with kids is........

Anyway, here's a couple of before shots for your gawking pleasure.

The fabric is $14 per meter from Spotlight and comes in a few colours, off the top of my head a brick red and a rusty orange, as well as this lovely blue. The recovering is simple enough, with the seat just being screwed into the base, the difficult part for me is:

- Getting the kids to take there nap at the same time. Ada goes down, Freddy gets up etc.

- Firing a big staple gun without waking either of them up.

- Finding said staple gun.

 - and lastly - 

- door to door salespeople, of which there seem to be a great deal in my area, knocking on my door ALL THE TIME! I need neither Pay TV, nor to change my utility providers, and yet they keep coming, like flies at a picnic or ants in the bathroom or snails in the letter box. It seem's every time I get to sit down, someone want's to sell me something.

But enough of this drivel, the point I'm trying to make is, I want to re-cover these chairs, it should be simple if only I could get 5 minutes to scratch my arse and throw a few staples in a couple of dinky, mid century chairs!

to be continued..........lol

Bumper Harvest

Andrew's Mum has sent us down some the first crops of autumn from the farm. Quinces, Apples and Olives, they might look a treat but anyone who has ever prepared the above knows I'm going to have my work cut out for me. The apples I will just stew and freeze, maybe I'll make some apple jelly. The Quinces are destined to be poached and I'll make a big batch of Quince paste and the Olives, well they're going to be taking a bath for the next 6 months.

I'd better get my backside into gear......Olives first.

5 things

Ok, so this is the first blog meme I've ever taken part in. I usually save all the meme stuff for my uber nerdy husband, but as this meme dosn't seem to involve a keyboard cat or cat's and "cheezburgers" I'm kinda into it. I read about it over at Lark and followed the trail back to Meet Me at Mikes.
The rules are "List your Five Faves for the week on your blog and then link back to the post at Mikes.


So...without further a due, My five favourite things of the week are........


1. this little guy turned 4 months and rolled over for the first time (he was most surprised)

go Freddy go!

2. this little girl started painting with a narrative in mind! lots of lovely people and monsters and 'bums' of all things! So far the stories have been, well enlightening, let's just keep it at that.

Ada at the easel 

3. I won a prize! A beautiful candle hamper from Queen B, full of hand rolled beeswax tapers and hand poured tea lights.  All thanks to Lucy over at the Design Files my favourite daily read (so much nicer to wake up too than the news don't you think?).


4. Dancing to this song with Ada http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppNC0uAaCv0

5. Watching  The IT Crowd on iView. Moss, I LOVE YOU! 

Hunting with the pack

Today I hit Camberwell market with Cintia from My Poppet and together we managed quite a haul. I really enjoy bargain hunting with a friend and the experience can be all the more pleasurable when you have a clear idea of what the other person is after. The extra set of eye means you don't miss a thing and sometimes a different opinion can be really handy.

Cintia has sick ninja skills and spotted some of the best finds of the day. I took home a few choice pottery pieces and a couple of very special owl dolls (I'm hoping to find out more about these guy's, they're absolutely amazing). Cintia, she pretty much took home everything else, but I'm sure she'll tell you about that :)

little blue bee hive honey pot

massive bumper harvest bowl

Japanese candle holders

Owl businessman doll,

(complete with newspaper and leather briefcase)

Sailor owl, painfully adorable.

Well rub my belly and call me lucky!.....

It appears this blogger (that would be me), has won the Queen B giveaway over at the Design Files! Hurrah! Now I'm set for earth hour on the 27th of March and my house will be filled with the heady scents of burning bees wax for months to come.

I was going to post some wishful one day's but have been feeling a bit uninspired by 'stuff'  this week. Instead  I thought I would show you some images taken from a series of vintage British House & Garden decorating and design guides from 1974. I often look through these books and marvel at the sheer opulence of the featured interiors but also I am astounded by the number of furniture and design pieces that are experiencing a renaissance right now.

How great is that lampshade and the typographic vase!

Practical, no. Awesome, totally!

Chevron roller blind, cool.

little red bird

best fifty cents I ever spent! He comes from Finland but that's all I know. He's on the window ledge drying out after a dip in the toilet on the weekend.......sometimes it sucks being a little red bird.

Flea's, White Elephants and Carboots....you get my drift?

After wrestling a bit of free time on the weekend I hit the Dandenong Savers and Oakleigh market with mixed results. I found a few interesting pieces at Savers, some overpriced brik-a-brack, a cool yellow enamel tap some very serious old school headphones and a spunky plaid wool cot blanket for Freddy (think Bay City Rollers). The best find was a set of 5 vintage children's buckets from Oakleigh in super bright colours with a slightly grotesque circus relief, awesome!

Grotesque Circus buckets from Oakleigh market (number 5 has already been annexed by Ada).

I loved this lamp from Savers with the super cute wee Dutch kids, but I thought the $90 price tag was a little high, given the condition.

Whistle for your milk child's cup at Savers.

Cane armchair at Savers.

Alf Phone awesomeness at Oakleigh market.

Wishful thinking Friday!

I thought I would close off the week with some more what if's, someday's and sigh inducing possibilities..........

Faux bamboo furniture by Robert Plumb

Poppy clutch by Nancy Bird

Replica 'Claude' chair by Matt Blatt

Necklaces from the latest Lizzy Fortunato summer '10 collection

sigh and bye!

Terrarium fun!

Iv'e been itching to have a go at making my own terrarium for a while now. Ada and I had stacks of fun making a couple of them this morning. I used some old chemists jars that had collecting dust in the bathroom and we gathered the moss and fungi from the front yard (how cool is the orange stuff, thank you dead tree that I never got around to cutting down!). The end results of the first couple are a bit iffy, but once the moss has grown  into it's new home and filled out a bit I think it will look a very pretty picture indeed!

I just found these really great 'how to build a Terrarium' videos over at MonkeySee, very helpful!

On a different note, but still in the realm of curio's, I've been thinking about that glass butterfly dome I found at the Salvo's on the weekend.  I might go back and see if it's still there. I've been imagining all the things I could do with it sans faded, 'seen better days'  butterfly's and pine cones. With the Oppe Shoppe fairy on my side I might just get lucky!

Crafty Bizness

Remember those vintage sheets I posted about last week? Well I finally got around to turning a couple of them into a quilt cover and pillowcase for Ada's new big bed. Quick & Easy and super bright! I'm quite happy with the result. The image is a bit shaky (no sun = very dark bedroom), but you get the picture :)

Next on the list, finishing Freddy's sailor tattoo quilt, complete with appliqué prison swallows!

Show & Tell.........

In spite of the monsoonal weather I actually managed some good hunting this weekend!


After a quick trip on saturday morning to Seaford,  I stoped off on my way home at the Noble Park Salvos for a quick fossick through the isles.

aperitif anyone?

great selection of vintage 35mm cameras

100 year old arts & crafts footstool, maybe?

nature under glass

Swedish clay dish 

The bottom two pictures are of a dish by Nittsjo from Sweden, I just love it (reminds me a lot of Dutch Gouda pottery). I also found a really lovely footstool (third image from the top), it was covered in a very fifties horsey bar-cloth fabric however, the lady behind the counter assured me it was 100 years old and made from old tin cans (hence the $90 price tag). I'm assuming it has been re-upholstered but wonder if it isn't an old arts & crafts piece?


Personally, I took home a beautiful, deep blue, floral maxi dress that looks like something a grown-up Holly Hobby might wear and some super bright vintage towels I hope to turn into bib's for the littlest pickle.


Overall, a little bonier than the last time I was there but still plenty of good stuff!


All of the items pictured above might still be in the shop so if you like them go check it out.


Salvation Army Store
400 Princes Highway
Noble Park, VIC 3174
(03) 9795 8301

Wishful thinking Friday

Fridays are wishful thinking day's. Day's reserved for flicking through magazines, big cup's of tea and day dreaming about dream homes and what I would do if I won the lottery.

So in honour of the impossible, the un-likely and the imagined, I present to you a pictorial list of things I own in my imagination

(images from Marimekko )

Oiva Tableware (meaning 'in good company) by Sami Ruotsalainen for Marimekko

(image from the Sanna Annuka website)

The Shaman's Tepee Limited edition silk screen print by Sanna Annukka 

(image from the RETROMODERN website)

Fun dressing table by RETROMODERN Furniture (at $650, I think this one has totally got a chance of becoming a reality, one day)

(image from the Anthropologie website)

Laelia quilt, by Anthropologie  (it just looks so rich and textural) 

Well that's it for today, my imaginary credit card has been maxed out (is that even possible)? and I need to bugger off and do the grocery shopping. Have a wonderful weekend and I'll be back on Monday hopefully with some good market finds.

xxx